MAJOR STARS | T.T. the Bear's Place | January 19 | It's Major Stars' second record for legendary ripshit imprint Drag City, and it already feels like home. Snippets of Return to Form promise more crapped-out guitar amps, spilled beer, and tangled, sweaty hair than any band has a right getting away with, and singer Sandra Barrett bellows out more than her share of husky, bizarre-world grunge vocals (plus the requisite buttload of O-face guitar solos). The band's been busy with outside stints in Life Partners, Carlisle Sound, Pants Yell!, and of course running the Twisted Village record store, but all hands will be on deck when this eight-song psych bomb drops.10 Brookline St, Cambridge | 9 pm | $8 | 617.492.BEAR or www.ttthebears.com

MASCARA | Middle East upstairs | January 29 | Mascara's Fountain of Tears might be one of the year's weirdest local offerings. Not '80s Boredoms weird, but like Joni Mitchell's head-scratching jazz phase, as played by a spaced-out garage-prog band that drives a van with a wolf mural. CEO Chris Mascara leads the trio through this maze of left turns and campy echo-chamber melodrama. There's a seven-minute noise-drone monologue about high school insecurities, but that's nothing compared to the overall Gang of Four-meets-Andrew-Lloyd-Webber deal going on here. Bring your dreamcoats.472 Mass Ave, Cambridge | 9 pm | $10 | 617.864.EAST or www.mideastclub.com

THREE DAY THRESHOLD | Paradise Rock Club | January 30 | The grizzled rock-and-country men of Three Day Threshold went on a vision quest this year and came back with one thing on their mind: whiskey. After getting invited down to Kentucky for a heavy bro-down with Jim Beam grandson and head distiller Fred Noe this past fall (which included several free trips to open barrels), the band was understandably inspired. The record, Straight Out of the Barrel, drops at singer Kier Byrnes' eighth annual Rodfest fundraiser show for a Stonehill College scholarship.967 Comm Ave, Boston | 9 pm |$20 | 617.562.8800 or www.thedise.com

THICK SHAKES| P.A.'s Lounge | February 20 | Splattered garage blues lost its home base last year when the Abbey Lounge closed its doors, but locals Thick Shakes have proven their business model works fine right out of the suitcase. The three-piece make gut-wrecking fuzz-rock straight off a Nuggets disc, and they swear two-thirds of the band never picked up an instrument until last year. A blindside beatdown at a party last fall that guitarist Tim Scholl walked into has put some delays in the band's release schedule, so the new tracks have been up for grabs for a while. They're finally getting a proper release via Austin's Snugglehound Records on shiny new cassette tapes.345 Somerville Ave, Somerville | 9 pm |$10 | 617.776.1557 or www.paslounge.com

HENRY GALE| Great Scott | February 18 | Boston quartet Henry Gale are already onto their second EP, a follow-up to last year's head-rushingly great Other Voices. This band's made short work of mastering the starry soundscapes and chiming guitars of all your favorite post-rock records — while editing out all the waiting around for things to happen. Earthbound gets a victorious self-release at Great Scott (with Horsehands), but in the meantime check their MySpace for video footage of the least conflict-ridden recording session ever.1222 Comm Ave, Boston | 9 pm | $9 | 627.566.9014 or www.greatscottboston.com

Trans Am | What Day Is It Tonight? Trans Am Live, 1993 - 2008 Trans Am are distillers of guilty pleasures, mixing fat AOR riffs with sleazy electronic accents and a propulsive attitude typically reserved for arcade soundtracks. What Day Is It Tonight? covers the DC-area band’s 20-year history with high-quality, high-energy live cuts taken from their many tours.

Various Artists | Panama! 3 If you purchase a copy of Soundway’s wonderful Panama! 3 — and you should — you get two things for the price of one. First, this is a carefully curated CD of “Calypso Panameño, Guajira Jazz & Cumbia Típica on the Isthmus 1960-75” that will keep you smiling — and perhaps dancing — for a healthy while.

The Big Hurt: Lambert works it, 50 blows it, Moz ends it ADAM LAMBERT 's spicy AMA performance continues to dominate entertainment headlines, weeks after it first scandalized the nation — but why does America care what a man does with another man in the secluded privacy of the American Music Awards?

Beyond Dilla and Dipset With a semi-sober face I'll claim that hip-hop in 2010 might deliver more than just posthumous Dilla discs, Dipset mixtapes, and a new ignoramus coke rapper whom critics pretend rhymes in triple-entendres.

Various Artists | Casual Victim Pile: Austin 2010 The notion that regional musical flavors exist independently in American cities is quickly becoming an archaic truism, seeing as how the world really is a stage these days, at least in the digital sense.

Review: In Search of Beethoven Phil Grabsky's exhaustive documentary doesn't exactly dispel any stereotypes about Beethoven's being a shaggy genius prone to rages.

INTERVIEW: TALKING WITH MISSION OF BURMA'S ROGER MILLER | January 18, 2012 This weekend (January 20-21) brings a two-night stand at Brighton Music Hall for post-punk godfathers Mission of Burma, who have somehow morphed into a band that's equal parts internationally renowned throwbacks and prolific local underdogs.

TRYING TO FIND NOW | January 04, 2012 William Gibson — the writer who famously coined the term "cyberpunk" and whose classic tech-punk novels like Neuromancer and The Difference Engine helped spawn a couple generations' worth of bleak, busted fantasies — is now on tour promoting his first collection of nonfiction.

DENGUE FEVER ADD ECCENTRICITY TO PSYCH POP | June 01, 2011 For all the kitsch and B-movie flair of Dengue Fever, there are still a few aspects of their obsession with Cambodian pop that they haven't put on record.